“Obamacare is racist”

When I think of elderly people, including the ones naive enough to have believed Obama’s lies (at their age, they should have known better), my heart bleeds as I try to imagine them navigating Obamacare, and that’s true whether the system works or is broken. No matter what, a generation that wasn’t raised on computers, and that may be further hampered by physical disabilities, is not going to find even the best possible site easy to navigate.

My mother, who was born in the very early 1920s, is a very bright woman, but she was never able to master computers. The is true for all of her friends, both the ones I’ve known my whole life and the ones I’ve met since she moved into a retirement community. My father, my mother-in-law, and my father-in-law, alav ha-shalom, all had the same problem. They were old dogs, and computers were a new trick. This cartoon pretty much sums it up:

If you’re laughing, it’s because you know someone — probably a person over 70 — who views the computer precisely that way. Obviously, this isn’t true for all older people, but it’s certainly true for a greater number of them than you’d find in the 50-70 cohort. Moreover, in the under 50 cohort, I think you’d be hard-pressed to find anyone who doesn’t have at least some familiarity and comfort with computers.

For the older people, dealing with Obamacare is going to be a nightmare — and they are the some of the ones who will be most intimately connected with it. After all, I doubt that many, if any, of them have insurance with pregnancy benefits. That means that, if they don’t get insurance through some retirement fund, their policies will be cancelled and they’ll be pitched into the Obamacare marketplace. Once there, they’re going to have to figure out the Obamacare exchange.

Robert Avrech, at Seraphic Secret, reminds me that I’ve forgotten another cohort of people who can’t handle the difficulties of Obamacare. Unlike the elderly, who are limited by vision problems or arthritis or dementia or unfamiliarity with a new technology, these people are limited by . . . race, and only by race.

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I’m only 56, but I’m embarrassed to admit how many of those buttons ring a bell. My M-I-L just wouldn’t touch the thing at all (late 80s). We’ve been advising her not to make even the tiniest change to her Medicare Advantage plan; maybe that way it will survive grandfathered a while longer.

Navy Bob

I think Medicare takes care of us old geezers. No need to register for Obama Care. Of course how one gets a supplemental policy I don’t know. Tri-Care for life works for me.

SADIE

Several years before I turned 65, I started to do my homework with the help of a health insurance professional explaining the differences between a Medicare Advantage Plan and all the others with letters A-G. Part D, the prescription drug plan is more complex or I really should say more compTax. Failure to sign up when you’re eligible results in the average cost of Part D and not necessarily the least and best inexpensive plan. What few people know is that you can change your supplemental any time of the year, but you’re locked into the D part for the fiscal year. OTOH, the cost of any prescription can change in the course of the fiscal year and you’re stuck.

Caped Crusader

Being close to 80, my wife and I have been concerned about lack of maternity benefits for quite some time now; so it’s nice to know we’ll soon be covered and we can relax if our birth control fails. Just one more worry and burden comrade Obama has lifted from our shoulders. He’s so nice and caring to us old folks. And can you believe there are actually some people who don’t love him; shame on them!

Gringo

My mother was in her 60s when PCs became common in homes. She never made the effort to learn to use computers. I can understand that.

However, a friend of hers did make the effort in her 60s to learn computers- also encouraged by using computers at her job- and came up with an insightful comment about computers: “The computer doesn’t do what I want it to do. It does what I tell it to do.”

So true.

It isn’t just the elderly. Others have pointed out that the kind of people who go uninsured often have trouble navigating the various paperwork requirements of our day. The complex interaction with the Obamacare website will not be up their alley.

lee

Over at Radio Free NJ, one of the bloggers remarked that a friend of his said the Healthcare.gov fix will probably consist of “Print out this PDF, file it in, and mail it back.” I am inclined to agree.

Libby

My parents are over 70 and pretty computer savvy, but they do freak out when things go wrong (viruses, etc.) – who doesn’t, though? They’ve also seen an increase in friends who have been given palliative care instead of treatment in the past few years, when their lives certainly could have been extended. Their theory is that Obamacare is going to limit treatment for seniors not only to save on costs (thanks, Ezekiel Emmanuel!), but as a way for the government to get their hands on their money faster (estate taxes) and get their homes on the market. Probably doesn’t hurt that a lot of Tea Party movement folks are older and better versed in history, the Constitution, etc. (like those WWII vets defying the NPS). Paranoid?

Call me Lennie

I think the main reason the millenial generation are so arrogant in their profound ignorance of fundamental concepts of all previous civilizations is that their obvious, vastly superior skills in this all important, world changing technology causes them to feel contempt for their elders — in a way never before seen in all of human civilization.

And so, the principles of their elders, like the primacy of religion, become jokes. This also leaves them completely vulnerable to the leftism that seeped into the computer world in its infancy. It may also explain their astounding naivete, not to mention magical thinking, concerning the monstrous levels of debt that will come crashing down on their heads someday; they must think that some future internet magic will simply make that problem disappear.

It’s not so much the lack of coverage that will get older people or computers, but euthanasia and death panels. Eventually the costs are going to skyrocket and then people will need to cut down on healthcare resource drains, in order to keep lining their own pocket if nothing else.

Texan99

Lennie, that makes me chuckle a little. My neighbor and his wife live with his 95-year-old mother, who’s amazingly spry. They’re working hard to make their place more self-sufficient, including keeping chickens for meat and eggs. Almost every day they look to her for advice about things like how to kill and butcher chickens. She’s got some skills of the kind that may turn out to be more valuable in the coming years than all the young computer experts imagine.

SADIE

Take away the millenial’s electricity for a few days and let’s see how contemptible they remain towards the elders.

One of the still best ways to transfer generational knowledge is through family businesses. It’s no coincidence that the Left prioritizes destroying mom and pop stores to replace them with Eminent Domain privatized shopping malls and recreational resorts.

I mean, how can mom and pop shops compete against a Leftist regime allied with Warren Buffet and Bill Gates? They got enough money to force taxation and regulations to break the smaller competitors alone, let alone apart.

You have me feeling very special. I turned 77 on the 26th and have been using computers, at home, since the days of the CPM Kaypro II. I love them, they are the greatest tool to come down the pike in a very long time. I have taught many to use and love them, but there are some who are in what I as a southern Texas lady call the “poor little me” phase and still don’t want to admit they cannot change a lightbulb. I hate to speak too harshly of them but really, if you can read and write, not even type, you can learn to use a computer.

Texan99

To make your eyes pop out of your head: Chris Matthews wants to know, as an American, what happened in Benghazi, anyhow?